Development of a three-dimensional blood-brain barrier network with opening capillary structures for drug transport screening assays.

The blood-brain barrier (BBB), a selective barrier regulating the active and passive transport of solutes in the extracellular fluid of the central nervous system, prevents the delivery of therapeutics for brain disorders. The BBB is composed of brain microvascular endothelial cells (BMEC), pericytes and astrocytes. Current BBB models cannot reproduce the human structural complexity of the brain microvasculature, and thus their functions are not enough for drug assessments.

Brain microvascular endothelial cells derived from human induced pluripotent stem cells as model for assessing blood-brain barrier transferrin receptor-mediated transcytosis.

The blood-brain barrier (BBB), a selective barrier formed by brain microvascular endothelial cells (BMEC), represents a major challenge for the efficient accumulation of pharmaceutical drugs into the brain. The receptor-mediated transcytosis (RMT) has recently gained increasing interest for pharmaceutical industry as it shows a great potential to shuttle large-sized therapeutic cargos across the BBB. Confirming the presence of the RMT pathway by BMEC is therefore important for the screening of peptides or antibody libraries that bind RMT receptors.

Adapalene suppresses sebum accumulation via the inhibition of triacylglycerol biosynthesis and perilipin expression in differentiated hamster sebocytes in vitro.

Background: Acne is a chronic inflammatory disease in sebaceous glands and pilosebaceous units where excess sebum production and follicular hyperkeratinization are observed. Adapalene, which exerts comedolytic and anti-inflammatory effects, is used for the topical treatment of mild to moderate acne.

Objective: We examined the effect of adapalene on sebum production and accumulation in sebaceous gland cells (sebocytes).